Canku Ota

(Many Paths)

An Online Newsletter Celebrating Native America

February 8, 2003 - Issue 80

Keeping a Tradition Afloat

credits: Photo 1: by Larry Steagall; Photo 2: In 1909, Jack Adams, a member of the Suquamish Tribe, built a canoe for an Indian canoe race at Seattle's Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition. Adams built the vessel from a single 48-foot log. On September 6, the canoes raced to the finish line at the foot of the fair's Pay Streak, in Portage Bay. In this photo, Adams and ten other men paddle the canoe on Portage Bay.

The scene from the shore looking southeast over Agate Passage was something out of a different century.

With arms and paddles rising, then in unison sinking into the glassy waters below, about two dozen members of the Suquamish Tribe marked a chapter in an ongoing return to tradition.

"We were a canoe people," said tribal chairman Bennie Armstrong as he watched the growing parade of canoes from the shore near the Suquamish Tribal Center. "This is bringing us back to our ancestral highways."

The voyages were part of an all-day event Jan. 18 attended by about 600 people from tribes from California to British Columbia. They came to see two Suquamish canoes blessed, to honor those who built them and to feast on seafood.

Some arrived in canoes of their own, including members of the Port Gamble S'Klallam Tribe and Squamish Tribe of North Vancouver, British Columbia.

The decision to build the wooden canoes was made at the Songhees Reserve at Victoria, British Columbia, during summer 2000. During potlatch, leaders from different tribes determined the Suquamish should have a cedar canoe of their own.

One was built last year by a group of five youths. Rob Purser, a tribal council member, said that canoe was damaged last summer on its way back from a canoe journey to North Vancouver.

Tribal leaders decided to repair the canoe this year in conjunction with building a new, matching vessel.

Both built from a 1,000-year-old Canadian cedar tree, the two Suquamish canoes are 35 feet long and are identical in their black, grooved exteriors and burgundy interiors divided into five sections by varnished wooden seats, a princess seat up front and a skipper seat in back.

Ray Natrall, a member of the Squamish Tribe from British Columbia, led the construction of both canoes, which included teaching the spiritual and historical process as well as the actual building.

The crew typically began the workday around 6 a.m., staying with the project until dark.

"A lot of prayer went into sticking this one out and putting all that stuff into the canoe," said We-laka Chiquiti, a 26-year-old member of the Suquamish Tribe who was one of seven who built the new vessel, a process that began in late October.

If there were negative feelings among crew members, work would stop until the bad feelings were gone.

"I wouldn't have wanted to work on it if I had felt angry or jealous," Chiquiti said. "I wouldn't have wanted any of that negative energy put into the canoe."

On Jan. 18, the eight builders stood under the mid-afternoon sky between the two finished canoes on the Suquamish Tribal Center grounds.

A few hundred others also stood during a half-hour blessing ceremony. Purser asked that there be no photos or written descriptions of the ceremony, maintaining the tribe's commitment to preserving oral history.

"This is for the people here," he said. "If people want to see it, they need to come here."

They might not get a chance soon. Purser said it was probably only the second time in the past 100 years that the ceremony, which for a time was outlawed by the U.S. government, had been performed on the Suquamish Reservation.

Its purpose, Purser said, was to continue the commitment made by the builders, clearing the canoes of any bad thoughts.

"It's a ceremony that all people in the canoe have to work together. Any negative feelings in the canoe can cause accidents," he said.

After the blessing, about two dozen tribe members lifted the first canoe to waist level and hauled it down to the shore. Then another group lifted the second canoe on its shoulders and placed it alongside its twin.

Nine people boarded the new canoe and left the shore as about 50 people cheered its maiden voyage. The second canoe followed, holding about 13 crew members.

Being in the canoe as it sailed away from shore was the highlight of the entire three months of work for Chiquiti.

"The only way I'd describe it is like having your children born," he said.

More canoes joined the new ones on Agate Passage, including the S'Klallam and Squamish vessels.

It was a scene that is making a comeback as Pacific Northwest tribes restore the traditions of their ancestors.

"This is kind of making two parts whole," said Armstrong, referring to the two canoes from the same tree meeting in the waters of Agate Passage. He could just as easily have been talking about the traditions of the ancestors becoming part and parcel again of tribal life.

"Now we're going to see canoes lined up on our beaches again," he said.

Adding to the spiritual symbolism, an eagle passed directly overhead as the five vessels negotiated the waters between the Tribal Center shore and Bainbridge Island.

John Chiquiti, a Suquamish resident and father of We-laka, saw the eagle's visit as more than coincidence, saying, "It came to give its blessing, too."

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